United Counties Council of Illinois (UCCI) is an organization that represents Illinois counties in advocating and tracking legislation. The UCCI began collaborating with IGPA and in 2005 a formal relationship was created that has led to extensive educational programs for county officials on a variety of public policy issues. The flagship of this collaboration is the UCCI Leadership Academy. This Academy contains 10 days of educational programming and this is spread out over eight sessions. The Academy exists to increase the leadership ability of county officials and through this effort, to increase the capacity of county government to meet its challenges and provide services for citizens in Illinois counties.